


The Appliance of Science

by aftereighteen



Category: Swimming RPF
Genre: Kid Fic, M/M, Tissue Warning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-24
Updated: 2012-11-27
Packaged: 2017-11-19 10:51:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,336
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/572468
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aftereighteen/pseuds/aftereighteen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fluffy angst is the best way I've found to describe this (there are sad elements).</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Baby's First Christmas

“Ok dude, pay attention because there’s gonna be a quiz on this later,” Ryan begins. He shifts his body to face the tree and settles the baby against his left arm so that he can point with his right.

He starts near the bottom. The very bottom of the tree isn’t decorated – despite their advancing years and the fact that it’s placed on a small table, Carter and Stella still can’t be trusted with temptation when it dangles anywhere near their range of vision. So Ryan had settled for an extravagant bow around the pot the tree is planted in.

“Oh, actually, I missed a bit,” he remembers. Ryan steps back a little, careful to avoid the dogs’ tails and legs as they’re sprawled around him on the floor. “You were like, a glimmer in Santa’s eye, maybe not even, when we got this thing. Your dad and I got this up north and he thought I was nuts when I said I wanted to move it down here, but it woulda been bad luck to not bring it.”

He pauses, lost in the thought, figuring out how to continue. “Even he thinks I’m stupid sometimes, like the rest of the world, but this isn’t stupid, dude. Don’t ever let anyone tell you that. We got this tree the year he retired and it was really small. I was pissed. I wanted a huge tree and to make it a big deal, but he told me it’d grow. So after we’d nursed it through a few years, I couldn’t even dream about leaving it behind. It’s our tree. Your dad’s and mine and now it’s yours too.”

The baby fusses against his arm so Ryan moves to his left, closer to the tree again, bouncing the baby gently to keep him quiet. Neither of them can remember the last time he’d slept through the night. Ryan’s convinced it’s karma – they’d been pretty smug when he’d slept through from his eleventh week, but the wheels had come off two months later when he’d started properly cutting teeth. Their sisters had laughed, telling them this was when they really learned what it was like to be parents. Boy was it a steep curve.

Ryan had been mid-season so Mike bore the brunt for three months. The minute Ryan was done, Mike couldn’t hand their son over fast enough, and Ryan had been carrying the night shift baton like a champ for the past month. It wasn’t always easy, but nights like this weren’t so bad. At least tonight there was no primal screaming, just quiet whimpers and an inability to settle. When it was like this, Ryan normally leashed up one dog at a time and went for three walks – and was very glad he’d persuaded Mike to move to Florida, because midnight walks in December just weren’t an option in Maryland, no matter how many coats you wore.

It was raining when the baby had gotten him up, so he’d had to find a new way to try and get him back to sleep whilst not falling asleep on him. Ryan had quickly learned that lying down on the couch to watch TV only put adults to sleep, not squalling babies. He had no idea why babies fell asleep easily when upright, but with this one in particular it seemed to work. Ryan finds the ornament he’s looking for and points it out.

“I love this one,” he says, lowering his voice a little as he continues to jiggle about on the spot. “It’s the first one we got. Your dad told me off, said it was too big for a little tree, but that just made me want it even more.” He smiles, nudging the figure-skating mouse so that she spins on her string, blades glinting as the glow from the tree lights hits them. “Because like he said – the tree would grow.”

He shifts his body again, lifting his son up a little to bring his gaze level with a candy cane. “These are essential. Your dad says he doesn’t like ‘em all that much, but I know his game. Last year, he stayed up late wrapping gifts one night and when he came to bed, I knew. He left the lights off so...” Ryan stops himself, clearing his throat, “so, er, he wouldn’t wake me. And so I couldn’t see what colour his tongue was. But I could taste it on him. Candy canes and toothpaste so don’t taste the same. You might want to remember that. But anyway. I love ‘em. It’s not Christmas without these things. Another good thing to remember.” He glances down at the baby and winks.

The baby squirms a little against his arm, but as Ryan looks down at him, he knows it’s a good squirm, the kind that means he’s settling down. Ryan smiles at his son and gives himself a mental fist pump. It must be working, so he takes another step around the tree and seeks out another decoration to talk about.

He chuckles as he remembers the story behind the silver orb that’s decorated in a childish way to look like a cat’s head wearing a Christmas hat. Ryan tilts the baby so that he can see it, even though his eyelids are drooping shut. “I bought this ‘cause I thought it might scare the dogs,” he starts, snorting at the memory. “Which was a stupid idea – nothing scares Stella and Carter’s got bigger fish to fry. It was another one your dad hated on sight – honestly, dude, I had no idea he was such a snob about this shit until I started buying crap – so I played him: spun him a line about it being super important to me because it’d been handed down through five generations of Lochte’s and my Grandma had chosen me as the one to have it and some other shit. You should’ve seen the look on his face when he realised it was gonna hang in our house for a month every year.”

He smiles again as he finishes the story. “The best bit was when he told my dad he was honoured to have it, because it clearly meant so much to me and the family and your Grandpa looked at him like he was batshit and quietly asked me how many beers your dad had had. Classic.”

There’s a Santa with cotton balls for a beard and the fur trim on his hat. Ryan’s body tingles as he remembers the birth of this decoration. “Your cousins made that with their Uncle Mike’s help,” he smiles. “I was out at practice and he was here with them and your Aunt Kristin and when I got home there was glitter everywhere and things were stuck to things that shouldn’t have been. My kinda heaven, y’know? And your dad used to freak out – he’s a big fan of order and control. But I walked in that day and something was different. He just... grinned at me. And I’ve never been so relieved, because I always knew. I knew I wanted kids and I knew he’d be a kick ass dad but he didn’t know. And I was getting worried, dude. I thought he might not get there. But that smile on his face? Those cotton balls on Santa’s face? He got it. He was ready.”

Ryan leans down and drops an imperceptibly soft kiss on the baby’s forehead. “He was ready.”

Ryan’s voice softens further as he spots another ornament which holds another precious memory for him. It’s an intricate and fragile glass house, painted and decorated so that it looks like a gingerbread cottage, with space for a teeny candle in the middle which they lit for the first time last Christmas day. 

Without meaning to, Ryan clasps the baby tighter as he whispers the story behind it: “We bought this when we found out about you. We hadn’t seen each other for, uh, a month or something. Your dad was busy with his golf thing and I was doing some fashion stuff and we crossed paths in Germany for some fuck knows what reason. And I was so glad we did because we were waiting on these test results to see if it’d worked, if you’d stuck. I’ve never watched my phone so closely, dude. We were totally on edge. And the phone rang in the middle of this tacky as fuck tourist shop and...” Ryan’s voice cracks at the memory, “...and the doctor told us that we were gonna be dads.”

He exhales, trying to steady his voice. “And fuck the podium. Fuck being asked to be your dad’s husband. That was the best moment of my life up to that point. We never even got that excited when we won races, even the really big ones. And your dad wanted champagne and I wanted something glittery. So I bought the little house.”

The baby’s heavy against his arm now and Ryan knows he’s asleep, but the final story he has is the most important one of all, that’s why it takes pride of place at the top. He tells it anyway, even though he’s told it before and he knows he’ll tell it countless other times, maybe even to his grandchildren one day.

Ryan stops moving, stays perfectly still as he cradles his son and looks at the angel on top of the tree, golden curls and halo backlit by the soft glow from the first creep of the new dawn breaking through the cracks of the blinds.

“You know I don’t love girls like I love your dad,” he whispers, “but they’re important. Like, my mom and your dad’s mom and our sisters and every other girl in the world. But this one’s really special. Even though we won’t know her like we know you.”

Ryan bites his lip, feeling his eyes fill as his vision swims a little. He wishes he could blame the tears on the fatigue. He doesn’t really notice when the first one spills over and drops onto the baby’s cheek, he just keeps talking.

“Her name’s Ava. Ava Lochte-Phelps,” he murmurs. “I wish she could be here. I wish she could smile at you and hold our hands and tell us about her day and pick out clothes and dance and sing and play. But she never will. She didn’t make it, bud. Before you, there was her. And we lost her. It was too soon and she was too small. But to me, she looked perfect. I couldn’t understand it. It didn’t seem fair.”

He drags his gaze away from the angel atop the tree to look down at his sleeping son again. “You’ve got a big sister. She’s waiting for you and I hope it’s a really long time before you meet her. But until then, every year, she’s here. Joining in. Guarding the tree from the dogs. Watching us open our presents. Part of the family. Just like you.”

When Ryan looks up at the tree again, at their angel, a movement in the doorway catches in the corner of his eye. Michael steps into the room, looking dazed, but not from sleep deprivation. He’s soon by Ryan’s side, arm around his shoulders, letting Ryan sink his weight against him.

Together, with the sleeping baby in Ryan’s arms, they look at the angel. “I’m looking forward to meeting her,” Michael eventually says softly. Ryan nods against his chest in agreement.

“But this,” Ryan replies, tilting his face up to look at Michael, “what we have... this is good.”

Michael smiles at him a little sadly. “It’s perfect, Ry,” he agrees. “We got our baby’s first Christmas.” He brings his lips down to kiss Ryan carefully, raising his free hand to stroke their son’s head tenderly.

When Mike pulls away, he smiles again at Ryan. “I think you should wait until he’s a little older before you quiz him, though.”

Ryan grins. “Don’t worry. Give it a few years and a few more sleepless nights and he’ll know them all backwards. Even when I’ve bought tons more shiny shit.”

Michael holds back a groan. “Sequins and sleepless nights?” he kisses Ryan again. “Bring it on.”


	2. Making It

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ryan and Michael become parents (kid!fic)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is also a little linked to "Arrivals". Please heed the tissue warning!

Ryan stares blankly at the cup in his hand and knows he can’t fill it. Not today, probably not ever. There’s a knock at the door and he manages to rasp out a, “Yeah?”

“You okay?” Mike’s voice asks.

Ryan glances back at the cup and the stack of magazines in front of him – wanting to smile at the dim memory of his and Mike’s reaction to the extensive provision of magazines aimed at straight guys the first time they’d been to the clinic, how Mike had just given him a wink that said, “no way I’ll be needing those” and how full of expectation they’d been, not even hope or dreams, pure certainty that this’d work – before walking over and opening the door slowly.

Mike knows as soon as he sees Ryan’s face that his question was completely redundant. He didn’t think he’d ever seen Ryan farther from okay. Michael pushes the door open completely, swoops into the room and envelops Ryan in a tight hug.

“It’s gonna be alright,” he murmurs, shooting for soothing. “We don’t have to do this now.”

“Mike,” Ryan mumbles, “fuck it, I...I don’t ever want to. I can’t. I can’t do this.”

Something flickering in Mike’s mind wonders what Ryan would do to drag Michael out of this if their positions were reversed, whether the Floridian would make some crack about being able to get it up or perhaps a, “sure you can, I know you’re good for it” or something. But he knows now really isn’t the time. He wonders idly how other couples cope, how they go on, and makes a mental note to ask their therapist at the next visit. Because he’s sure as hell running out of ideas.

“We’ll talk about that later,” he insists. “Let’s go home, figure out when we can come back and try again.”

Ryan pushes him away then. “No,” he says firmly. “I don’t want to try again.”

*

Michael comes home to a quiet house, the smell of something good cooking hitting him as he walks through the door. So even though there’s no noise, Ryan must be home. It’s a nice day, so he wonders if his husband – his stomach still jerks a little when that word comes to mind – is out by the pool.

His guess is right, Ryan’s on his favourite lounger, Carter’s head in his lap and the two remaining puppies sprawled out on the deck beside him. As usual when near a body of water, Ryan’s wearing the world’s tiniest Speedo and a pair of sunglasses. He’s also reading something intently.

Michael crosses the patio and leans down to give Ryan a kiss, rubbing Carter’s ears as he does so. Ryan smiles as Mike pulls away, “Hey, didn’t hear you get back.”

“You were concentrating pretty hard,” Mike observes, pulling another lounger over and sitting sideways on it to look at Ryan. He takes the other man’s free hand – his left, the one now bearing a ring, which he rubs his thumb over with a smile – and squeezes it. “Looks serious. Anything interesting?” he nods towards the pamphlet in Ryan’s hand.

Ryan flips it over to show him the cover. “Stuff about the next step, what’s happening next week.”

“We already did our part. Don’t we just wait?”

Ryan shakes his head and sits up, pulling his sunglasses off and turning to face Mike. He takes Michael’s left hand with his right and looks straight at him. “We have to choose,” he tells him.

Michael looks confused. “Choose what?”

“Well, we both contributed, yeah? And they mixed our stuff with the egg donor’s stuff and made some embryos,” Ryan reminds him.

Mike nodded. “Yeah, we have two each. But it doesn’t matter, Ry.”

“No dude, it does,” Ryan tells him. “The pamphlet says so.” Michael waits for Ryan to continue, slightly stunned at how well-versed Ryan is. Normally they wait for the doctors to explain this stuff. “They can’t implant both of our embryos. It’s not allowed. So we have to decide whose go into the surrogate and whose get stashed in the freezer for next time.”

“Oh,” is all Michael can manage.

“I know, right?”

“Yeah,” Michael lets out a gusty breath.

“You should have a read, bro,” Ryan says. “I mean, I’ve given you the basics there but...this thing’s good for pros and cons. I’ve got an opinion having read it so, uh, I don’t wanna influence you or shit. Will you please read it?”

Michael nods. Ryan stands up, squeezes Mike’s shoulder and kisses his forehead. “I’ll go inside and finish dinner. Take your time, yeah? We’ll talk about it later.”

Michael nods again and settles down to read.

Later, as they eat on the deck, Michael finally finds the courage to blurt out his decision. “I think it should be yours.”

Ryan puts his fork down and fixes Michael with an impassive stare. “What makes you say that?”

Michael swallows his food and takes a sip of water, trying to remember what the advice from the clinic said. “Well, it mentioned stuff about considering the primary caregiver of the child, and how it’s sometimes good to have the biological parent be the one who spends less time with them, so that it’s easier for them to bond and stuff.”

He pulls his eyes away from his plate and looks up into Ryan’s nervously. Ryan’s just waiting. “And, well, you’re still swimming so I’m stay-at-home-Dad and you’re working-Dad so...I think this one should be you.”

Ryan’s about to speak when Mike jumps in, grabbing his hand across the table. “I was looking at the puppies when I read it,” he says quickly. “And I remembered what I told you when they were first born, that I’d like a little Lochte. So here’s our chance. You go first.”

Ryan squeezes his hand and laughs, “I’m so glad you said that, dude. I was worried you were gonna make some lame crack about letting me win for a change.” Michael blushes and Ryan just grins.

The older man squeezes Michael’s hand again, returning to a serious tone. “Are you sure?”

Michael nods. “Positive.”

“We’re not having a little Lochte, though,” Ryan says, startling Michael. “She or he will be Lochte-Phelps,” Ryan reminds him with a smile. Michael picks up his glass, Ryan raises his and they drink to it.

*

They sit together watching all three phones – both of their cells and the barely-used house phone – wishing that they’d agreed with the clinic which would be the main contact number. As they stare intently, Carter starts barking and runs in to bounce up at Ryan who, for the first time ever, swats his beloved dog away.

Carter persists and Mike’s about to get angry at Ryan for not shutting his dog up when the doorbell rings. Which explains everything.

Michael isn’t even aware that he’s made the decision to let Ryan take up phone-watch duties alone until he’s at the front door pulling it open. He’d assumed it’d be some sort of random stranger trying to sell shit, but it’s actually someone coming to buy: they’d both forgotten that the penultimate puppy was due to depart.

As he rounds up the relevant things for the puppy’s new owner, Michael strains hard to detect any hint of a phone ringing. He rushes the dog and owners out of the house as soon as possible, and skids back into his position at Ryan’s side.

Ryan stands up and paces the floor, unable to bear the tension any longer. Carter trails around after him and, sure enough, it’s Ryan’s phone which rings. He dives to answer it, almost breaking his neck as he falls over Carter in the process. Michael catches him and rights them both as Ryan takes the call, chewing his lip nervously.

“You’re sure?” he asks, as Michael cranes his neck to try and hear what the person on the other end is saying, thinking that he should’ve reminded Ryan to put it on speaker. “Okay, thanks very much.”

Ryan hangs up and stares at the phone. Michael thinks he might combust. He grabs Ryan’s arms and almost shakes him. “Dude, you have to tell me!”

Ryan slowly tilts his face upward to look at Mike and a smile breaks out across his features. Michael loves Ryan’s smile, but in that moment, he loves what it’s telling him even more.

*

“Mike, will you just help me out here? I’m trying to be sensible for a change.”

As Ryan flings his R8 through the next set of lights and into the parking lot of the hospital, the irony of his statement isn’t lost on Michael. He grits his teeth before replying.

“I know, but how do you think Carter’ll react?”

“Dude, he’s the least of my worries right now,” Ryan stares at him like he’s just suggested using his own body to carry their next child. Ryan puts the car into park and reaches across the console to take Mike’s hand. “I want everything to be right for the baby. A puppy is not what we need. Someone’s interested, they seem like good people. I don’t want to turn down a good home, okay?”

Michael gets out of the car, feeling a little pissed off with Ryan, who had initially wanted to keep two of the puppies. Probably because he’d assumed that although Michael had said yes in theory to having a baby, convincing him to realise the dream would take a lot longer.

Ryan follows him into the hospital calmly, recognising this behaviour. Mike’s nervous and won’t admit it. Ryan’s used to it, and he waits it out.

When they’re called into the consulting room, the lights are dim and their surrogate’s waiting on the bed. They both greet her with a smile and sit down quietly, facing the screen. Michael takes Ryan’s hand and chances a look at his husband: they’re both holding their breath.

This is the third time they’ve done this now and each time has been terrifying for different reasons. The first was alarming because it was fairly early, so it took a while to find what they were looking for, but the waiting was worth it. The second time, they’d been worrying about counting fingers and toes, but that was for nothing too, when they were all found to be present and correct.

Today, they were due to find out what colour they should be painting the nursery. They both insisted that they weren’t bothered about the baby’s gender, but they both knew that was a pack of lies.

As the wand passes over the surrogate’s belly and the image starts to become clearer on the screen, Ryan realises he’s slid onto the edge of his seat, and that his ring is probably making a pretty serious dent in Mike’s hand. He runs his gaze over the baby’s head, face, arm, back, waiting for the nurse to speak. She presses some buttons and pauses the screen to capture an image.

Eventually, she turns to them. “Would you like to know the gender of your baby?”

They both nod enthusiastically, tightening their grip on each other’s hands.

The nurse smiles. “Congratulations, it’s a girl.”

Ryan can’t contain himself. He leaps up and punches the air with a whoop that’s way too loud for any hospital building. Mike just stares at the nurse, mind boggling. Ryan gives the surrogate a kiss before hauling Michael out of his seat and giving him an altogether more passionate kiss.

“We’re having a daughter,” he whispers in Michael’s ear, totally in awe of the feeling rising through his body.

Mike’s still in shock and just mumbles back. “Where the hell do we even start with that?”

Ryan pulls away and holds Michael out in front of him, looking at him seriously. “Now do you agree about the puppy?”

Michael just nods.

*

Two weeks later, Ryan’s hanging swatches in what will be the nursery when the door bell rings. He puts the pieces of fabric down and answers the door to the new owners of Amilli’s remaining puppy.

As he’s getting everything sorted, his phone rings and he rejects the call without even looking to see who it is. Not even thirty seconds later it rings again. He rolls his eyes and apologises to his guests, rejecting the second call just as quickly as the first.

When the phone rings for the third time in a minute, the woman collecting the dog raises an eyebrow. Ryan blushes and answers the call, even though it’s Mike and he’s probably asking something dumb to do with cereal.

“I’m busy,” Ryan tells him.

“Get un-busy,” Michael’s voice is insistent but panicked, “and get to the hospital.”

Ryan’s heart almost hammers through his chest, his brain starting to go wild at the possibilities of family members or friends who could be in mortal peril. He concentrates on telling himself repeatedly that it’ll all be okay because Mike’s okay because Mike’s talking to him and if Mike’s talking he must be okay.

“Who is it?” he finally grits out.

There’s a heart-stopping pause before Mike answers: “It’s the baby.”

*

What worries Mike most is that Ryan doesn’t seem to be capable of processing it. He feels like he’s tried everything – he’s talked Ryan into therapy, he negotiated with Gregg and Ryan’s agent for them to go on vacation, he’s spoken to their moms. Nothing’s helping. Ryan’s shut down.

The last thing on his list is to try again. They’ve been to the clinic twice and Ryan’s done the same thing both times. Michael’s quiet on the drive home, thinking through what might be triggering it, how to help Ryan turn around.

It hits him at 4:30am when Ryan gets up for training. Michael lies awake as Ryan creeps around in the bathroom, gathering his things together to head out.

“C’mere,” Michael whispers as Ryan’s about to leave. His husband pauses at the door, but eventually turns around and stands beside the bed.

Mike sits up and pulls Ryan down for a tender kiss. “I’m doing this because I love you,” he murmurs. “Please listen to me?”

“I’ve gotta...” Ryan’s sentence trails off and he sighs. “What is it?”

“Let’s try again,” Mike says evenly. 

Ryan kicks himself for not expecting this. Give Michael Phelps a goal and there’s no stopping him until it’s checked off the list.

“I can’t,” Ryan chokes a little on the words.

“We can,” Michael insists. “We’re doing it together. We don’t even have to do anything, I just have to call them and they take care of it.”

Ryan looks down at Michael’s hand on his and knows he’s lost this round. He nods wordlessly, reluctantly tugs his hand away and leaves the house.

Michael doesn’t sleep another wink, just waits for the clock to tick round, thinking about Ryan swimming his sets and what to say when the time comes. As the sun creeps past the blinds, Michael swings himself out of bed, goes to make a pot of coffee and picks up his phone.

“Use what we already have,” he tells the doctor. “And we’ll hear in a few weeks?” he nods, although the doctor can’t see him. “Thanks.”

Michael pours the coffee and starts waiting.

*

The news is due any minute, so of course they’re in the noisiest shop in the entire city and Michael’s struggling to keep tabs on Ryan due to the abundance of glittery ornaments in the vicinity. But, bizarrely, it’s helping him to relax. He hangs back and watches Ryan flit around the store, excitedly examining different things and scrutinising them, scrolling through his mental catalogue of what they already own and which item will clash the most.

His phone begins to vibrate in his pocket and he tugs Ryan into the corner to take the call. He can’t look at Ryan as he listens to the doctor, but he can feel his hand going numb where the other man is clinging to it tightly.

Michael hangs up and relays the news to Ryan. “It worked.”

“Really?”

Michael nods. “Let’s get out of here, this calls for champagne.”

“Just gimme one minute,” Ryan insists. “I’ve found the perfect thing.”

Michael doesn’t stop to congratulate himself on finally finding the answer for how to fix Ryan – fuck knows he learned from last time not to count this particular chicken until it hatches and is screaming and shitting in his arms – but he does relish every second of the rest of the day. They pretty much run hand in hand to the nearest decent bar and almost don’t need glasses for the champagne they pop open and down as if it’s going out of style.

Another bottle disappears and Ryan drags Michael back to the hotel and for the first time in the last pretty miserable five months, they well and truly make love. The slow, passionate kind that Michael never understands why they don’t do more of, because it’s fucking brilliant and Ryan’s the love of his life and in that moment when it’s so good that he feels that he might cry, Ryan’s there to match him breath for breath and whisper in his ear that he loves him and he’ll always love him and Michael knows that he’s the luckiest man who will ever live. Because some things in his life were worth all of the hard work and pain, and other things could be just as hard and just as painful but were worth so much more than the rest.

*

They’re back in the hospital and holding hands again. But this time, shit’s about to get real.

Their surrogate’s been labouring all night, but they’ve been told it’s close now and they still can’t really decide what to look at and where to put themselves. Michael stopped listening to what the staff were saying hours ago, and instead busied himself with making sure that Ryan was okay.

A piercing cry breaks the air and Michael feels like he just pounded the wall and broke the surface of the water for the mythical ninth time. Ryan’s vibrating on the end of his arm and when Michael turns to look, his husband is crying. He automatically puts his arm around Ryan and pulls their heads together.

“It’s okay,” he murmurs, “it’s over.”

A nurse approaches with a screaming bundle and Ryan can’t stop crying but when they’re asked who should hold the baby first, Michael doesn’t hesitate in indicating towards Ryan. That stops the tears and Ryan turns to look at him.

“Are you sure?”

Michael nods.

“But...it’s yours.”

Michael shakes his head. “Ours,” he corrects firmly. “Go on.”

Ryan turns back to the nurse and waits for her to place the baby in his arms. It’s only then that Michael notices the colour of the blanket and thinks to ask, “It’s a boy?”

The nurse smiles and confirms with a nod. “Would you like me to take a picture of the three of you?” It’s Michael’s turn to nod again and he hands her his phone.

Michael puts one arm around Ryan, who’s gazing reverently at the baby in his arms, and reaches his other hand out to place on the baby’s chest. Their son wriggles once more before settling into Michael’s touch and thrusting an arm out to greet his dad.

The baby’s fingers curl around one of Michael’s and he’s vaguely aware of the camera flash. “Congratulations,” the nurse says, handing Michael his phone. “He’s perfect.”

Ryan looks up at the sound and seems to come back to earth a little. He leans in and presses a kiss to Michael’s lips.

“Thanks again,” he murmurs, “for pushing me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those who hadn't yet guessed, I'm British. I've tried to keep the healthcare stuff as factually accurate as possible (and I've learned a lot about surrogacy and IVF!), but this is based on British stuff that I found (because... well it was just easier. Having a one-stop source for healthcare info made my life a lot simpler. If it's not the same deal in the US, I apologise!). I worked my plot around the facts that I found, as well as the message I wanted to convey. I hope it works.


End file.
